A. Field of Invention
This invention pertains to systems providing IP communications over the Internet including VOIP (Voice Over IP) and VIP (Video over IP). More specifically, a system and method is described that provides efficient IP (VOIP, VIP etc. . . . ) communications between various different internet service providers (ISPs).
B. Description of the Prior Art
Providing telephone (and video) communications wholly or partially over the Internet has been found to be advantageous, More and more entities (including large and small businesses, non-profit organizations, state and federal agencies and individuals) have Internet connections, and most of these connections are broadband connections that provide much more bandwidth than dial-up connections. Wireless Internet connections are becoming common, thereby providing an effective means of replacing or at least supplementing cellular communications. Another advantage is that, at least for the moment, Internet communications are governed by less stringent regulations than telephone communications.
Currently VOIP and VIP services are provided by various communication and Internet-related companies, including both conventional telephone carriers making use of Plain Old Telephone Switching (POTS) and Internet Service Providers (ISPs). Competition between these companies for customers is very strong.
A major stumbling block for the spread of VOIP communications is that each user has a telephone line assigned by a telephone company and an Internet connection (such as a Domain Name or IP address) that is separate and unrelated to the user's telephone line. Since there is no centralized directory correlating telephone lines with Internet connections, ISPs can typically establish fast Internet communications only for their own users. In other words, fast Internet communications can be provided only between two customers of the same ISP. For all other connections, the ISPs have to establish hybrid communication lines, e.g., lines including both Internet connections and standard telephone lines and switches including PSTNs (Public Switched Telephone Networks) and PBXs (Private Branch Exchanges). One such system is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,069,890. Understandably, this approach is much slower than the pure Internet lines, and more expensive.
Another approach is to have the ISP interrogate sequentially various intermediate nodes (including routers and gateways) until a node is found that provides service for a device associated with the requested telephone number. Of course, depending on the distance between the respective nodes, this may be a very slow process.
A further problem faced by ISPs is that each has its own type of equipment and internal protocols; hence, even if a line is established between two subscribers of different ISPs, communication may not take place because of system incompatibilities.
Various schemes have been suggested for overcoming these problems. Most of these schemes involve providing massive data banks correlating telephone numbers and IP addresses. Some of these schemes are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,674,745; 6,772,210; 6,810,034, as well as U.S. Applications S.N. 2003/00024762003/0095542; and 2004/0081141. Some of the other schemes include LNP-Telephone Number Translation, DNS-Domain Name to IP address mapping, ENUM-Electronic Number Mapping, DUNDi-Distributed Universal Number Discovery. However, the problem with all these schemes is that if the data banks contain entries for all the subscribers, the amount of time required to find the proper IP address from a telephone number becomes prohibitive and unacceptable to subscribers who are used to the almost instantaneous response of most POTS switching systems.